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God and Physical Cosmology Faith and Philosophy: Journal of the Society of Christian Philosophers Volume 22 Issue 5 Article 2 12-1-2005 God and Physical Cosmology Metropolitan Filaret of Minsk and Slutsk Follow this and additional works at: https://place.asburyseminary.edu/faithandphilosophy Recommended Citation Filaret of Minsk and Slutsk, Metropolitan (2005) "God and Physical Cosmology," Faith and Philosophy: Journal of the Society of Christian Philosophers: Vol. 22 : Iss. 5 , Article 2. DOI: 10.5840/faithphil200522516 Available at: https://place.asburyseminary.edu/faithandphilosophy/vol22/iss5/2 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at ePLACE: preserving, learning, and creative exchange. It has been accepted for inclusion in Faith and Philosophy: Journal of the Society of Christian Philosophers by an authorized editor of ePLACE: preserving, learning, and creative exchange. GOD AND PHYSICAL COSMOLOGY Metropolitan Filaret of Minsk and Slutsk As the dialogue between science and religion has grown more robust, Christians have been led to more nuanced ways of thinking about the con - nections between these two modes of inquiry. This essay focuses on explor - ing various deficiencies in naturalistic conceptions of the cosmos, and fur - ther exploring how Eastern Orthodox theology provides a more encom - passing picture of human beings and their place in the cosmos. I. Dialogue between science and theology Our aim in this volume is to exchange views on the general theme of God and Physical Cosmology. It is needless to say how important and relevant the dialogue between Christian theology, philosophical research and scien - tific thought is in our time. This dialogue has been long under way. Our task is to develop it, involving new participants, proposing new approach - es and taking into account the latest philosophical and scientific findings. The intellectual history of the 20th century has vividly shown that all radical schemes setting religion and science against each other have become out of date. Certainly there is still a difference in the methods employed in scientific research and theological thinking. There are, howev - er, striking parallels that can be seen between modern theories proposed by fundamental science and the theological vision of the universe. While it is difficult to speak about any convergence of interpretations, the very exis - tence of common ground compels theologians and scientists to seek and 1 discuss ways towards mutual understanding and intellectual cooperation. In order to make this cooperation fruitful, it is necessary to set forth clear - ly the Christian view of nature and origin of the world as it has developed in church tradition. In my presentation I will speak about the fundamental assertions on theological cosmology in its Eastern Orthodox understanding. II. Origin of the world The starting point here is the ontological dualism of the created and the uncreated. The world is a created entity; it was created by God, the Creator “from nothing” ( ex nihilo ). This means that the world does not have a foun - dation of its own as it hangs, so to speak, over the abyss of non-existence. At the same time the world does exist. Moreover, as the meaning of the Greek word cosmos suggests, the world is “order” and “beauty.” Precisely FAITH AND PHILOSOPHY Vol. 22 No. 5 Special Issue 2005 521 All rights reserved 522 Faith and Philosophy these qualities of physical orderliness and esthetic proportionality indicate that the world’s existence is not accidental or imaginable but completed in a certain sense and therefore authentic. The same qualities point to a certain Origin or Source transcending the existence of the world itself, that is, to the Cause that builds the world. To be a proportionate whole the world has to have its Builder who is both Architect and Artist (Hebrews 11:10). The Christian teaching on the creation however draws only an indirect analogy with creativity as known to us from human experience. Indeed, a human being creates something from materials available to him. Besides, the creative action of a human being, however free and unforced, still depends on the context, including the material itself since a human being is already inside the world. It is quite a different matter when we speak about a creative action of God. God the Creator does not have any material outside Himself because “before” the creation there was nothing but God Himself. “Nothing” from which God creates is of an absolute nature. But God does not create from Himself either, otherwise what He creates would be divine. Finally, God creates absolutely freely, with nothing either “outside” or “inside” Himself forcing Him to create a different, new entity. This conception means that it is only the will of God the Creator that caus - es the creation and founds the created existence. Ontologically God and the world are radically separate, so much so that the Church Fathers refuse to use the term “existence” at the same time for God and the creation. At the same time, the bond between God and the world is extremely strong, for the world is called from non-existence by God’s will, which is immutable. In this sense, theologically, the “support” of the world is more solid than any “natural law,” the “solidity” of which itself needs to be theoretically substantiated. III. Non-Christian conceptions of the world The theological conception of the origin of the world has a number of impor - tant implications. First of all, it should be said that it differs considerably from both the ancient, pre-Christian, cosmology and the scientism of the Modern Time. This applies first of all to the ideas of the self-sufficiency and completeness of the world, or rather, to the interpretations of these ideas. For the ancient Greeks, the world was essentially an orderly whole. Even God cannot transgress the laws of proportion and justice by which the beautiful and harmonious cosmos lives. As subject to the highest onto - logical necessity this cosmos is complete. There is no room in it for freedom 2 or chance. The world as law is also a source of moral law. For the so-called scientific worldview of the Modern Time, the world is first of all nature, which is primary with regard to man. Nature is gov - erned by laws inherent in it and generates by these laws the human being as one of the natural phenomena. At the same time, man is extremely small in the face of the physical cosmos. The rationality of nature is pre - cisely what the human being is called to come to know as the ultimate truth of the world. The human being is doomed to the endless explo - ration of nature as infinitely exceeding them. GOD AND PHYSICAL COSMOLOGY 523 In scientism, there is no ethical dimension at all. As an object of scientific research and exploration the world, in Pushkin’s words, is “indifferent nature.” A moral concern emerges only when results of scientific research begin to threaten the very nature and humanity. It is only in the 20th centu - ry that science has begun to realize how important and even decisive the “human factor” is for the physical world (the role of observer, the anthrop - ic principle, etc.). In other words, both ancient and new European cosmologies are monis - tic. For them the world is complete and presents itself to man not only as something given but also as the ultimate necessity. Exploring and trans - forming the world as they can, human beings act within the rational neces - sity of nature. (One cannot help recalling here the Marxist definition of freedom as comprehended necessity.) IV. Principle of free will It should be stated that from the theological point of view, too, the world was completed in the creation. “And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which God created and made.” (Gen. 2:2) The Creator “rested from his work.” It means that the created world received certain autonomy, that is, an opportunity for existing as a differ - ent entity distinct from the divine entity and at the same time authentic. On the other hand however, it can be said that the completion of the world was “incomplete,” while its autonomy was limited. Indeed, the crown of the creation is man, a “different god.” It was to man as God’s spe - cial creation that God entrusted the physical cosmos and the sphere of bio - logical life. The created world is given freedom, but it is human freedom. The world itself comes into existence as a result of a dynamic creative action, and this dynamic is laid down in the creation. It is not the dynamic of an evolving “indifferent nature,” but the dynamic of godlike human personalities. If the laws of the world are determined by the Creator’s will, and the creation is completed when the world is given to “another creator,” man, to rule, then the “cosmic nature” of the world – the order and beauty laid down by the Creator – is teleological, and conforms to the goal. This goal is not an ultimate necessity of cosmological law but the image of divine perfection, which does not work automatically but is offered free to man. Existence as created by the free will of the Creator remains dependent existence. The created world however is dependent not only because it is “incomplete” nor because the creation continues after the initial act of creation. It is a different form of dependence since, being generated by God’s free will, the world is bound up with freedom: it carries in itself the principle of free will.
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